The Nexus One's most expensive component is the Qualcomm Snapdragon processor.
James Martin/CNET

Google's forthcoming Nexus One smartphone is composed of components worth about $175, according to a teardown conducted by iSuppli.

The new phone, which Google unveiled Tuesday, offers an inside designed by Google and an outside designed by HTC. The primary interface is a 3.7-inch AMOLED display. The Nexus One runs Google's Android 2.1 operating system, and the WVGA display can show 3D graphics.

While Google has priced the Nexus One at $179 with a two-year T-Mobile service plan ($529 without a subscription plan), the phone has a bill of materials of $174.15, according to iSuppli analysis, which was posted Friday. The report notes that its estimate does not include other expenses such as manufacturing, packaging, and software.

"Items like the durable unibody construction, the blazingly fast Snapdragon baseband processor and the bright and sharp Active-Matrix Organic Light Emitting Diode (AMOLED) display all have been seen in previous phones, but never before combined into a single design," Kevin Keller, senior analyst for iSuppli, said in a statement.

The most expensive of the 17 components in the HTC-built phone is Qualcomm's 1GHz Snapdragon processor, which rings in at $30.50, or nearly 20 percent of iSuppli's estimated bill of materials. Snapdragon debuted in February 2009 in the Toshiba TG01, which is based on Windows Mobile. But iSuppli found the ARM-based processor to be better utilized in the Nexus One.

"The Android 2.1 operating system used in the Nexus One better capitalizes on the Snapdragon's fast performance, making the user interface and applications run very quickly," Keller said. "This processing muscle also gives the Nexus One some advanced capabilities, most notably high-definition 720p video playback."

The next most expensive component is Samsung's 3.7-inch AMOLED display, which lists at $23.50. iSuppli notes that the AMOLED technology appeared previously in Samsung's Android-based I7500 with a 3.2-inch AMOLED touch screen.

"The 3.7-inch AMOLED display on the Nexus One delivers a stunning picture," Keller said.

Rounding out the top three most expensive components in the Nexus One is Samsung's 4Gbit (512MB) of DDR DRAM, which costs $20.40, or about 11 percent of iSuppli's estimated cost. iSuppli notes that comparable smartphones generally contain no more than 2Gbits of DRAM, but that the extra memory allows for better application performance.